After Antonio Rüdiger’s own goal quashed Manuel Neuer’s hopes of keeping a clean sheet in Germany’s 5-1 over Scotland, the veteran goalkeeper will be happy to have kept the ball out of his net against Hungary.
Following Germany’s clash with Hungary, the Bayern Munich goalkeeper was captured by @iMiaSanMia speaking about the clean sheet situation, saying, “We were unlucky to concede against Scotland, I thought we deserved a clean sheet there. It was very important not to concede today.”
Looking at Germany’s performances as a whole it’s fair to say that it has deserved one clean sheet from two matches. Ironically, the matches one would expect Germany to have avoided conceding in and the one where they actually managed to keep the ball out of the net were swapped, as Scotland only managed to accumulate 0.02 expected goals compared to Hungary’s 1.01 against the Germans (FotMob).
Manuel Neuer played a huge role in stopping Hungary from scoring, making up for a Joshua Kimmich mistake with a sliding challenge within the first minute and keeping out a Dominik Szoboszlai free kick later in the same half.
German television network Das Erste (via @iMiaSanMia) captured Neuer speaking about the importance of the win, with the 38-year-old saying, “We were determined to win today and confirm our performance against Scotland. We knew Hungary would be a difficult opponent. We were dominant and deserved to win today. You could see the euphoria in the stadium. Not just German fans, but all stadiums are full, all teams have a lot of fans – we’re happy to be playing this tournament at home.”
When asked if this most recent victory makes Germany a favorite for the tournament Neuer responded by stating, “Germany are always one of the favorites. But now we have to focus on the next game against the most difficult opponent in the group in my opinion.”
Look out Switzerland, this Germany team isn’t slowing down for anyone.